Columbia Riverkeeper
Columbia Riverkeeper (CRK) is a non-profit conservation group that works to protect and restore the Columbia River and all life connected to it. Columbia Riverkeeper is a member of the International Waterkeeper Alliance, created and led by Robert Kennedy, Jr. There is an evergrowing number of riverkeeper and baykeeper organizations worldwide. With offices in Hood River, Portland, and White Salmon, Washington, CRK staff and volunteers use a combination of grassroots organizing, education, and an on-river presence to improve water quality, protect aquatic habitats and restore salmon in the Columbia River Basin, from the Canadian border to the mouth in Astoria. CRK is closely engaged in reforming key water pollution policy issues in Oregon and Washington and its legal team also uses enforcement of state and federal environmental laws as a tool for restoring water quality and protecting key habitats.
Over the last 15 years Columbia Riverkeeper has been one of the leading advocates for cleaning up radioactive contamination at Hanford. CRK has successfully challenged plans to ship more radioactive waste to Hanford, called public attention to the Dept. of Energy attempts to ignore serious groundwater contamination at Hanford, and played an important role in making Hanford a national cleanup priority. In 2005, Columbia Riverkeeper litigation stopped the discharge of 360 million gallons a year of untreated toxic wastewater from entering the Columbia River. Over the next five years CRK’s 2005 legal victories will have kept over 800,000 pounds of heavy metals from being released into the Columbia.
Columbia Riverkeeper is actively engaged in stopping Liquid Natural Gas port terminals planned for the Columbia Estuary, reforming pollution control policy at the Oregon DEQ, and is initiating a River Watch program with volunteer citizen watchdogs on the Columbia from Canada to the Pacific. Columbia Riverkeeper works with local groups in supporting riverbank clean up and restoration projects, carries out programs in the schools and plans programs in partnership with river recreationalists.
Learn more: www.columbiariverkeeper.org
